Most people, when asked why they buy a product, will give you a rational reason. Maybe they liked the design, wanted a unique feature or just bought the first one they saw.
But dig a little deeper, and you’ll find that the real reason for buying is the emotion people feel when seeing a product or ad.
People buy what they love – what promises joy, inspires happiness and invites appreciation. But just as often, people buy things to soothe underlying fears. And whole industries have developed to help people manage, suppress or project unresolved emotions like anger and fear.
Let’s look at a few of those industries and the fears that they sell:
Insurance
Insurance companies promise protection against rare but devastating threats. They help people manage risks and dangers they cannot financially and emotionally account for.
Home insurance, for example, speaks to fear of losing one’s property to burglary, fire or natural disasters. Health insurance is a safeguard against disease and illness. It reassures us that someone will offer support when we fall sick. And travel insurance protects travellers from the cost and inconvenience of not being able to travel due to illness or personal issues.
The revenue model of insurance is simple: people pay monthly or annual premiums so someone will have their back when disaster strikes.
But what prompts people to buy insurance is not just the fear, but the expectation, that things can and do go wrong.
After all, would you buy home insurance if you KNEW your house was safe for the next 50 years? Would you buy health insurance, if you KNEW you would live a perfectly healthy life, never once relying on medical care?
Most definitely not.
You buy insurance because you think you need it. You expect things to go wrong – and are willing to give energy (money) to others, to bail you out when it happens. And the higher you think the risk is, the more you are willing to pay.
Preventative health care
The preventative care industry sells the fear of illness and death – that’s how your doctor, hospital and pharmaceutical companies make money off of healthy people.
Has your doctor ever encouraged you to come in for regular medical check-ups? Now, you may think he’s just concerned with your health, and wants to make sure you don’t have some rare, dangerous disease go undiagnosed.
That’s why he would offer all sorts of screenings for early disease detection. And while those screenings can help the occasional person stay healthier than they would with an undiagnosed, untreated illness – the screenings serve a dual purpose.
The real reason your doctor asks you to come in for a screening is so he can write you or your health insurance an invoice for the check-up. You come; the doctor gets paid. And if he finds that you’re ill, he can offer (read: sell) you a fitting treatment.
At these check-ups, he also – often unconsciously – reinforces the underlying narratives of the preventative care industry. How so? Maybe he says something along the lines of:
- “You might be sick without knowing it”
- “This guy didn’t visit his doctor regularly – and now he is seriously ill because of that.”
- “What if you died, when you could have been saved by going to an earlier check-up?”
This cycle of fear benefits the doctor and the pharmaceutical companies – often at the expense of his patients. And preventative health care is a growing industry, considering the increasing fears of illness and death in society today.
Home and digital security products
Burglar and fire alarms, bear spray, and digital key locks are just some of the many security products that people buy mainly out of fear of damage to themselves or their property.
While ensuring a certain level of safety is perfectly sensible – e.g. you might not want leave your front door unlocked – the security industry nurtures and reinforces underlying fears in its marketing messaging.
As a result, most home security products are sold through fear, rather than a rational assessment of the costs and benefits that they individually and jointly provide.
The same of course is true, for much of the cybersecurity industry – in which fear-based messaging compels people to buy software designed to protect themselves against all sorts of cybersecurity threats such as viruses, malware and data theft. Fear-based messaging can lead to overprotection rather than a reasonable assessment of individual risk based on online browsing behaviour and other forms of exposure.
Newspapers and media
Newspapers and online news sites cater to people who want to be part of a community or need to stay up to date on the latest world events.
But beyond the fear of missing out – that compels many readers to subscribe to news – the primary goal of the news media is to reinforce existing fears about all sorts of disasters and catastrophic mishaps.
Negativity sells – and so, fear-based messaging has historically been a major part of ensuring that advertising messages in newspapers are read and that the newspaper continues to maintain its audience.
Some people even become addicted to media and find themselves trapped in the cycle of learning about the latest threat and then taking preventative measures to protect themselves from it in their life.
Anti-ageing industry
The fear of becoming old and not being able to keep up one’s appearance is the primary driver of the anti-aging industry. From skin care products designed to prevent wrinkles to natural hair dye, anti-ageing products cater those who fear that they can no longer hide behind the façade of beauty.
What fears different industries speak to
| Industry | Fear of: | Marketing tactics | Example messaging |
| Insurance | Losing money or belongings | Catastrophic images | “Protect what you love.” |
| Preventative health care | Disease Death | Free check-ups or tests Annual assessments at physician | “Early detection can save your life” |
| Home security | Home invasion Burglary Theft Lack of safety | Crime statistics Security camera footage Real victim stories | “Can you really put a price on your family’s safety?” |
| Financial services | Poverty in old age Market crashes Economic uncertainty | Retirement calculators Crash prophecies and warnings | “You wouldn’t want to risk losing your life’s savings, would you?” “When the lies collapse, the market will come crashing down. Will you be left penny-less or with your mind at ease?” |
| Cybersecurity | Identity theft Financial fraud Invasion of privacy Extortion/blackmail | Hacking demonstrations Security scores Certifications and credentials Free malware scans | “One identity is stolen every 2 seconds.” “Imagine the horror of watching your life savings disappear to an offshore account on the Cayman Islands – and knowing that 20 years of hard work is gone a matter of seconds. Once the money leaves your account, you have no way to get it back.” |
| Anti-aging | Old age Loss of beauty | Before and after photos Celebrity endorsements | “Look and feel 10 years younger” |
| Beauty | Looking ugly Being judged for your appearance Not being attractive to potential partners | Influencer endorsements Photoshoots | |
| Self-defence | Violence and aggression Physical assault Vulnerability | Crime statistics Graphic photos of injuries Police reports/high profile court cases | “Every x minutes, someone in [your city] is mugged. Every .. days, someone is murdered. Violent crime is a serious problem. Are you prepared to defend yourself, so you won’t be the next victim?” |
| Survival | Death Natural catastrophes | Disaster preparedness guides Testimonials from survivals Disaster news | “Get ready to protect yourself, when disaster strikes and there is no one who can help you. If you prepare for the hard times now, you will thank yourself later.” |
| Education test prep | Failure | Statistics like university acceptance and test pass rates | “With the right preparation, you can pass your next exam!” |
The economic incentive to sell fear
In its simplest form, a business makes money by selling goods or services. The more goods and services it sells, the more money it will make. Now, businesses can either sell goods to more and more people (and expand their customer base) or sell more goods to the same group of people (by encouraging repeat purchases).
Of course, business leaders prefer to sell a product to customers multiple times if they can, because that means more revenue. Repeat purchases, do, however, mean that:
- the customer is facing the same problem again and again
- AND EITHER does not know how to solve it himself
- OR is not willing to solve the problem himself
Obviously, the customer may have good reasons not to solve his own problem – it may be expensive and time-consuming, and so he prefers to pay someone to do it for him.
This is why we to go to the grocery store or farmer to buy food, rather than planting it ourselves. It means we don’t have to worry about crops and harvesting, and can choose to focus our energy elsewhere.
But, when the problems we have are created or reinforced by the same industry that promises to solve them, things change. Now, instead of supporting our development, companies keep people trapped in a cycle of fear.
Fear is a natural response, of course, an emotion like any other. But when companies deliberately foster it, they can sell you a remedy to the fear they spread. The more scared their customer is, the more they will buy, and the higher bank balance of the company.
After all, fearful people buy more to suppress and/or soothe their fears. And more purchases mean more revenue.
Moving beyond fear: new narratives for insurance, preventative health and security products
As we’ve seen, many companies have financial incentives to reinforce fear in their customers.
But what if companies decided to stop nurturing fear in their prospects? What if, instead of using fear as a vehicle for sales – they decided to empower customers to start solving their own problems and worries?
Can you imagine what that would look like?
Insurance companies – instead of just selling insurance – might teach people how to manage and mitigate risk, and how to deal with the emotional and financial aftermath of a crisis.
Preventative health care could focus not just on screenings and check-ups, but show people how to look after their own mind and body.
Security companies would teach people about safe behaviour, appetite for risk, and how to decide which safety measures and precautions are sensible vs. fear-driven.
Can you imagine a world in which companies show their clients the energetic link between fear and disaster? Can you picture them sharing that we attract what we fear in their online seminars – and showing clients how to deal with challenging situations?
Surely, companies wouldn’t do that. That would lead to the collapse of their existing business model – for people who do not fear can no longer be sold to through their fear.
But even then, with less fear, people still have problems – so as a business owner, you don’t need to worry about truly helping your clients. Because when you help them solve one fear or problem, a new challenge for them will soon emerge.
Now, of course, it is up to people to decide if they want to face their fears – but when they do, they will soon encounter a new challenge, a potential roadblock, which companies can help solve.
And finally, as people leave behind fear and anger, love becomes a more compelling motivator for people to buy. And if you didn’t know already, love brings perpetual sales for any business who can give people what they love.
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